With the change of guard at New Delhi, new policy pronouncements are the order of the day. Ministers in charge of various departments, soon after taking over, have also announced their priorities. The focus however, remained on the foreign, finance, defense and home ministers. The extent to which the new dispensation is willing to continue with policies formulated by the NDA is being keenly watched.

This paper is an attempt to analyze India's newly proposed nuclear doctrine, announced by Natwar Singh, India's new Foreign Minister. The statement said India and Pakistan were now nuclear powers and so was China. "The three countries should get together and work out a common nuclear doctrine. This is a matter that needs to be discussed at the highest level." This would be done keeping in view the stands India has taken in the past on its nuclear programmme. Does the proposal match the country's past nuclear diplomacy? Or is Natwar Singh suggesting that enough has improved in terms of India's relations with Pakistan and China for the country to formulate cooperative arrangements with them on nuclear strategic issues? Does the Foreign Minister believe that Sino-Pakistan defence co-operation which includes their nuclear nexus does not pose a threat to Indian security?  a view held by not just the NDA but by earlier Congress governments as well. A historical analysis therefore, of the intensity of the Sino-Pakistani nuclear nexus and the stand India has taken over it is required to test the Minister's proposal.

Sino-Pakistani defence co-operation has been stimulated and sustained by the two countries over the last 35 years, with common hostility to India. Especially for Islamabad, the search for security vis-à-vis New Delhi has been the single most important factor motivating it to strengthen its defence capabilities. And this is a process in which Beijing has clearly played godfather. T V Paul writes, China's involvement in nuclear proliferation in South Asia has been long-standing. It is both a cause of and a contributor to proliferation in the region. As a military ally of Pakistan and an adversary of India, China has helped Islamabad to build its nuclear and missile capabilities. China has used this assistance to Pakistan as a way to balance India militarily and politically.

It is very difficult to assign a definite date for the beginning of Sino-Pakistan nuclear cooperation. One of the first pointers to the existence of a secret nuclear deal between Pakistan and China is contained in the last testament of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, where he said, "in the light of the recent developments which have taken place, my single most important achievement which I believe will dominate the portrait of my public life is an agreement with China of June 1976, which I arrived at after an assiduous and tenacious endeavor spanning over eleven years of negotiations. Now we have the brainpower, we have the nuclear power plant at Karachi. All we needed was the nuclear re-processing plant; we were on the threshold of full nuclear capability. This statement by Pakistan's former President makes it very clear that Pakistan was trying to establish a nuclear relationship with China since 1965. More information on their nuclear nexus started coming from various quarters as the intensity of the co-operation increased.

Keeping in mind the nuclear danger from its two neighbours, India went overtly nuclear and rationalised the explosions on two grounds: (i) China presents India with a direct military threat, as it had deployed missile and nuclear arsenals along Indian borders and since India has had boundary dispute with the former, it needed deterrence to meet any eventuality; (ii) the threat presented by China becomes even more dangerous because it had helped Pakistan in acquiring nuclear and missile technology, which the latter could use against India.

Though, the justification given above to defend India's nuclear blasts came just from ruling regime, earlier Congress governments, media and security analysts also held these views.

On 2 May 1989, The Indian Express wrote, "Starting with the transfer of technology for building the reprocessing plant at Nilore in 1965 to agreeing to supply heavy water in May 1976, the nuclear cooperation between the China and Pakistan has evolved considerably. Chinese scientists have been visiting Kahuta and China has provided a design of one of its own atomic bombs and enough highly enriched uranium for two bombs".

Expressing the Indian concerns over its security environment, the Congress Party's manifesto issued before the 1991 general election said, "We are deeply concerned that Pakistan is developing nuclear weapons. To meet its objective, it is taking help from external powers. It is hoped that they will desist from this disastrous path. They have already inflicted four wars upon India. In case Pakistan persists with the development and deployment of nuclear weapons, India will be constrained to review her policy to meet the threat".

In light of the above, readers and analysts need to decide whether the statement given by Natwar Singh, really holds any weight, or whether it was given in haste and was therefore premature.